A Fine and Terrible Mystery – Episode 25: The Return

This is episode 25 of my investigation into the life and works of Sir Thomas Malory, author of Le Morte d’Arthur.  Episode 1 can be found here.

In my last post I argued the probability that Sir Thomas Malory remained in London after his release from prison by the Yorkist army under the Earls of March and Warwick and Lord Fauconberg following their unruly entrance into the city on July 2, 1460. I further suggested that he may have participated in the brutal and violent siege of the Tower, which was still garrisoned by a Lancastrian contingent under Lord Scales and that some of the changes Malory introduced in his narrative of Mordred’s siege of Guinevere in the Tower could have reflected personal experience.

The three generals and the majority of their forces left London the day after their public ceremony declaring loyalty to Henry VI at St. Paul’s.  Their sudden departure after only 48 hours argues good diplomacy as well as military initiative as it both preserved the army’s discipline as well as the good will of the merchants and residents of London.  They marched north and encountered  a royal army under the king, the queen and the Duke of Buckingham on a sodden July 10 in a meadow on the southern bank of the River Nene.  Heavy rain fouled the royal artillery.  Thirty minutes into the battle, the King’s right flank, led by Lord Grey of Ruthin, defected to Fauconberg and Warwick loudly proclaimed that neither the King nor the common people were to be harmed, only the captains and professional Lancaster soldiery.  Discipline in the royal army collapsed.  The Lancaster generals, Thomas Percy, Shrewsbury, Beaumont and the Duke of Buckingham were all searched for and killed.  Less than thirty minutes later, the Earl of Warwick, the Earl of March and Lord Fauconberg discovered Henry VI in his tent and knelt to him.  They had “rescued” the King from his “evil counselors,” including his wife, who had evaded capture and fled north.  The Yorkist army returned south and entered London in a procession.  What did Malory think as he saw the King, the son of the Henry V, now a prisoner as he himself had been but two weeks before?  What did he think when he learned that his nemesis, the Duke of Buckingham had been killed?

The Lancastrian defenders of the Tower surrendered, their leader, Lord Scales, was summarily executed and Henry VI was imprisoned in the Palace of Westminster.  Meanwhile, Richard, Duke of York returned from Ireland, landing near Chester, and marched south in procession.  It was traditional, medieval political theatre; details from the chroniclers suggest the stage management, the production values, were exquisite:   York’s sword was born upright before him, the coat-of-arms of Lionel of Antwerp, 1^st Duke of Clarence, Edward III’s third son from whom York claimed descent (Henry VI’s claim was through John of Gaunt, the fourth son) was displayed along with the York heraldry.  The white and blue coat he wore when he was reunited with his wife Cecily at Abington was even embroidered with fetterlocks, a symbol used by his ancestor, Edward, Duke of York, the one great English magnate who’d died at Agincourt.  For those who could read the symbolism, and probably all the gentry and bourgeoisie could, the meaning was clear.  This wasn’t just the procession of the returning Duke of York, but a claimant to the crown, marching to London which was held by his eldest son, the Earl of March, and Warwick.

At ten in the morning on October 10^th, he arrived at the Palace of Westminster with a mounted contingent.  He entered the great hall, with a cloth of state held over his head by servants and his sword still born before him.

And was met with silence by the assembled peers and lords.

Henry IV’s 14 year reign, which began in pragmatic usurpation, consisted of nearly constant civil war, including the first battle between English armies both equipped with long bows, had not been forgotten.  In that battle at Shrewsbury, the Prince of Wales had been shot in the face with an arrow and nearly died of his wound.  Two thousand others had died.  In the English medieval imagination with its metaphorical hierarchical view of god, kingship, the state and the country, those 14 difficult, sometimes terrible years could be seen to have had a single source:  the usurpation of the throne of an anointed king.

Episode 26 can be found here.